Ahmad Sirhindi
Imām Rabbānī Shaykh Ahmad al-Farūqī al-Sirhindī (1564–1624) was an Indian Islamic scholar from Punjab, a Hanafi jurist, and a prominent member of the Naqshbandī Sufi order. He is described as Mujaddid Alf Thānī, meaning the "reviver of the second millennium", for his work in rejuvenating Islam and opposing the heterodoxies prevalent in the time of Mughal Emperor Akbar.Glasse, Cyril, The New Encyclopedia of Islam, Altamira Press, 2001, p.432 He is said to have had considerable and longlasting influence in India and to have given "to Indian Islam the rigid and conservative stamp it bears today." Aziz Ahmad, Studies in Islamic Culture in the Indian Environment, Oxford University Press, 1964, p.189 Most of the Naqshbandī suborders today, such as the Mujaddidī, Khālidī, Saifī, Tāhirī, Qasimiya and Haqqānī sub-orders, trace their spiritual lineage through Sirhindi, often referring to themselves as "Naqshbandī-Mujaddidī". Sirhindi's shrine, known as Rauza Sharif is located in Sirhind, India. Early life and education Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi was born after midnight, on 14 Shawwal 971 H. in the village of Sirhind. From an ashraf family claiming descent from caliph Umar, he received most of his early education from his father, Shaykh 'Abd al-Ahad and memorised the Qur'an. He was then sent to Sialkot, at present in Pakistan, where he learned logic, philosophy and theology and read some advanced texts of tafsīr and hadīth before he returned home.Sufism and Shari'ah: A study of Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi's effort to reform Sufism, Muhammad Abdul Haq Ansari, The Islamic Foundation, 1997, p. 11. Sirhindi also made rapid progress in the Suhrawardī, the Qadirī, and the Chistī turūq, and was given permission to initiate and train followers at the age of 17. He eventually joined the Naqshbandī order through the Sufi missionary Shaykh Muhammad al-Baqī, and became a leading master of this order. His deputies traversed the length and breadth of the Mughal Empire in order to popularize the order and eventually won some favour with the Mughal court.Medieval Islamic Civilization: An Encyclopedia, Routledge, 2006, p. 755. Sirhindi's world view Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi's preaching and revival was a reaction to what he saw as the 'anti-Islamic' policies of Mughal emperor Akbar. He denounced Akbar's policy of sull-i kul (total peace), and Akbar's reign as one where "the sun of guidance was hidden behind the veil of error." Sirhindi believed that "what is outside the path shown by the prophet (Sharia) is forbidden."Yohanan Friedmann has argued that there is no evidence that Sirhindi or his disciples spread "anti-Hindu sentiments wherever they went." [http://www.jstor.org/stable/614232?seq=1 Review by Simon Digby of Yohanan Friedmann Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi: an outline of his thought and a study of his image in the eyes of posterity], McGill-Queen's University Press, 1971, The current khalifah is a chinese person REZA p.110 Importance of Sharia v. Sufism According to Simon Digby, "modern hagiographical literature emphasizes Sirhindi's reiterated profession of strict Islamic orthodoxy, his exaltation of the sharia and exhortations towards its observance."[http://www.jstor.org/stable/614232?seq=1 Review by Simon Digby of Yohanan Friedmann Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi: an outline of his thought and a study of his image in the eyes of posterity, McGill-Queen's University Press, 1971] Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Vol. 38, No. 1 (1975), pp. 177-179 On the other hand, Yohanan Friedmann questions how committed Sirhindi was to sharia, commenting: "it is noteworthy that while Sirhindi never wearies of describing the minutest details of Sufi experience, his exhortations to comply with the shariah remain general to an extreme." [http://www.jstor.org/stable/614232?seq=1 Review by Simon Digby of Yohanan Friedmann Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi: an outline of his thought and a study of his image in the eyes of posterity], McGill-Queen's University Press, 1971, p.42 Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Vol. 38, No. 1 (1975), pp. 177-179 Friedmann also claims "Sirhindi was primarily a Sufi interested first and foremost in questions of mysticism."Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi: an outline of his thought and a study of his image in the eyes of posterity], McGill-Queen's University Press, 1971, p.xiv Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Vol. 38, No. 1 (1975), pp. 177-179 Oneness of being (wahdat al-wujūd) Sirhindi strongly opposed the mystical doctrine known as wahdat al-wujūd ('unity of being') or tawhīd-i wujūdi, a concept which emphasizes that in reality all things exist within God. Nonetheless, he did not hold a particularly unfavorable view of the sufi mystic and theoretician Muhyī 'l-Dīn ibn Arabī, who is often presented as the originator and most complete propounder of this philosophy. Sirhindi writes: I wonder that Shaykh Muhyī 'l-Dīn appears in vision to be one of those with whom God is pleased, while most of his ideas which differ from the doctrines of the People of truth appear to be wrong and mistaken. It seems that since they are due to error in kashf, he has been forgiven... I consider him as one of those with whom God is well-pleased; on the other hand, I believe that all his ideas in which he opposes (the people of truth) are wrong and harmful.Sufism and Shari'ah: A study of Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi's effort to reform Sufism, Muhammad Abdul Haq Ansari, The Islamic Foundation, 1997, p.247 In refuting the monistic position of wahdat al-wujūd, he instead advanced the notion of wahdat ash-shuhūd (oneness of appearance). According to this doctrine, the experience of unity between God and creation is purely subjective and occurs only in the mind of the Sufi who has reached the state of fana' fi Allah (to forget about everything except Almighty Allah).Encyclopaedia Britannica: http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/10170/Shaykh-Ahmad-Sirhindi Works Most famous of his works are a collection of 536 letters, collectively entitled Collected Letters or Maktubat, to the Mughal rulers and other contemporaries. It consists of three volumes. An elaborate printing of the book was accomplished in 1973 in Nazimabad, Karachi, Pakistan. It was reproduced by offset process in Istanbul, Turkey. A copy of the Persian version exists in the library of the Columbia University. Maktubat was rendered into the Arabic language by Muhammad Murad Qazanî, and the Arabic version was printed in two volumes in the printhouse called Miriyya and located in the city of Makkah. A copy of the Arabic version occupies number 53 in the municipality library in Bayezid, Istanbul. It was reproduced by offset process in 1963, in Istanbul. A number of the books written by Ahmad Sirhindi were reprinted in Karachi. Of those books, Ithbât-un-nubuwwa was reproduced by offset process in Istanbul in 1974. The marginal notes on the book, which is in Arabic, provide a biography of Ahmad Sirhindi. These Collected Letters has been translated into Bangla by Hazrat Shah Mohammad Muti Ahamed Aftabi Dinajpuri(R.) Selections from the Maktubat of Ahmad Sirhindi Naqshbandi chain http://www.islahulmuslimeen.org/golden_chain.asp # Sayyadna Muhammad SallAllaahu Alaihi Wasallam d.11AH, buried Madinah SA (570/571 - 632 CE) # Sayyadna Abu Bakr Siddiq, radiya-l-Lahu`anh d.13AH, buried Madinah, SA # Sayyadna Salman al-Farsi, radiya-l-Lahu`anh d.35AH buried Madaa'in, SA # Imām Qasim ibn Muhammad ibn Abu Bakr d.107AH buried Madinah SA. # Imām Jafar Sadiq, alayhi-s-salam (after which moves to Iran) d 148AH buried Madinah SA. # Shaikh Bayazid Bastami, radiya-l-Lahu canh d 261AH buried Bistaam, Iraq (804 - 874 CE). # Shaikh Abu al-Hassan al-Kharaqani, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d 425AH buried Kharqaan, Iran. # Shaikh Abul Qasim Gurgani, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d.450AH buried Gurgan, Iran. # Shaikh Abu Ali Farmadi, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah (after which moves to Turkmenistan) d 477AH buried Tous, Khorasan, Iran. # Khwaja Abu Yaqub Yusuf Hamadani, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d 535AH buried Maru, Khorosan, Iran. # Khwaja Abdul Khaliq Ghujdawani, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d 575AH buried Ghajdawan, Bukhara, Uzbekistan. # Khwaja Arif Reogari, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d 616AH buried Reogar, Bukhara, Uzbekistan. # Khwaja Mahmood Anjir-Faghnawi, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d 715AH buried Waabakni, Mawralnahar. # Shaikh Azizan Ali Ramitani, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d 715AH buried Khwaarizm, Bukhara, Uzbekistan. # Shaikh Muhammad Baba Samasi, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d 755AH buried Samaas, Bukhara, Uzbekistan. # Shaikh Sayyid Amir Kulal, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d 772AH buried Saukhaar, Bukhara, Uzbekistan. # Shaikh Muhammad Baha'uddin Naqshband, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d 791AH buried Qasr-e-Aarifan, Bukhara, Uzbekistan (1318–1389 CE). # Shaikh Ala'uddin Attar Bukhari, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah buried Jafaaniyan, Mawranahar, Uzbekistan. # Shaikh Yaqub Charkhi, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d 851AH buried Charkh, Bukhara, Uzbekistan. # Shaikh Ubaidullah Ahrar, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d 895AH buried Samarkand, Uzbekistan. # Shaikh Muhammad Zahid Wakhshi, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d 936AH buried Wakhsh, Malk Hasaar # Shaikh Durwesh Muhammad, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d 970AH buried Samarkand, Uzbekistan. # Shaikh Muhammad Amkanaki, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah (after which moves to India) d 1008AH buried Akang, Bukhara, Uzbekistan. # Shaikh Razi ūd-Dīn Muhammad Baqī Billah, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d 1012AH buried Delhi, India. # Imām Rabbānī Shaikh Ahmad al-Farūqī al-Sirhindī, qaddasa-l-Lahu sirrah d 1034AH buried Sarhand, India (1564–1624 CE) See also *Mujaddid *Ali Hujwiri References * Classical Islam and the Naqshbandi Sufi Tradition, Shaykh Muhammad Hisham Kabbani, Islamic Supreme Council of America (June 2004), ISBN 1-930409-23-0. * Shari'at and Ulama in Ahmad Sirhindi's Collected Letters by Arthur F. Buehler * NFIE Research External links * Biography of Hadrat Imâm Rabbânî * Biography of Imam Rabbani Ahmad al-Faruqi as-Sirhindi (from the [[Naqshbandi Haqqani Sufi Order|Naqshbandi-Haqqani Sufi Order])]. * Translations of Imam Rabbani's Letters in various languages Category:1560s births Category:1624 deaths Category:Indian Sufis Category:Naqshbandi order Category:People from Fatehgarh Sahib Category:Sufis Category:Sunni Sufis Category:Muslim philosophers Category:Muslim scholars Category:Hanafis Category:Mujaddid ar:أحمد السرهندي es:Ahmad Sirhindi ml:ശൈഖ് അഹമ്മദ് സർ‌ഹിന്ദി ru:Имам Раббани sv:Sirhindi tr:Ahmed Sirhindi ur:احمد سرہندی